First Loves: Poets Introduce the Essential Poems that Capitivated and Inspired ThemWhen Carmela Ciuraru asked her favorite poets to write about the poems that first inspired them, she was astonished by the illuminating responses she received. In turn, readers will be delighted by the intimate reflections on life and poetry found in First Loves.Affording close-up views of today's best poets, the book also (re)introduces readers to the timeless poems they selected. Sherman Alexie writes about recognizing the constant threat of violence on his reservation when he read Roethke's "My Papa's Waltz". It was a poem by her father that taught Virginia Hamilton Adair about the joys of poetry and the hidden life of her parent. J. D. McClatchy tells of first reading Homer by candlelight while eating a bowl of applesauce. Featuring many Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award winners, the book includes essays by Seamus Heaney, Robert Pinsky, Jorie Graham, Yusef Komunyakaa, and many others.Just in time for National Poetry Month, First Loves is a testament to poetry's matchless abilityto restore faith, offer salvation and solidarity, and above all, alter the course of human life. |
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Page 114
... kiss me on the upper arm at night and then seal the kiss with his fingertips . A gesture of unworldly tenderness . And then I remembered how I had stood by the side of my grandfather's grave when they lowered him into the ground .
... kiss me on the upper arm at night and then seal the kiss with his fingertips . A gesture of unworldly tenderness . And then I remembered how I had stood by the side of my grandfather's grave when they lowered him into the ground .
Page 131
From camp to camp , through the foul womb of night , The hum of either army stilly sounds , That the fix'd sentinels almost receive The secret whispers of each other's watch . Fire answers fire , and through their paly flames Each ...
From camp to camp , through the foul womb of night , The hum of either army stilly sounds , That the fix'd sentinels almost receive The secret whispers of each other's watch . Fire answers fire , and through their paly flames Each ...
Page 230
I was the one whose consciousness was connected to the nearing of the night , to its shadow creeping always closer . This description of the distant night's inevitable approach , even as it reflected my own increasing awareness of ...
I was the one whose consciousness was connected to the nearing of the night , to its shadow creeping always closer . This description of the distant night's inevitable approach , even as it reflected my own increasing awareness of ...
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Contents
Acknowledgments | 11 |
Introduction by Carmela Ciuraru | 19 |
Virginia Hamilton Adair on Along the Road by Robert | 25 |
Copyright | |
19 other sections not shown
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First Loves: Poets Introduce the Essential Poems That Captivated and ... Carmela Ciuraru Limited preview - 2001 |
Common terms and phrases
American beauty become beginning blood Blow body books of poetry born called child City close Collected coming Copyright course dark dead death deep desire dream early English eyes face fall father feel felt Galway green hand head hear heard heart Hilda Doolittle human imagination kind knew language later learned leaves light lines listen lives look meaning memorized mind moon mother move nature never night once Oscar Hammerstein II Perhaps permission poem poet poetry published reader remember Reprinted rhymes Robert round seemed sense singing sleep song soul sound stand Stevens teaches tell things thou thought touch trees turn University verse voice wind write written young
Bibliographic information
| Title | First Loves: Poets Introduce the Essential Poems that Capitivated and Inspired Them |
| Editor | Carmela Ciuraru |
| Edition | illustrated |
| Publisher | Scribner, 2000 |
| Original from | the University of California |
| Digitized | 1 Apr 2008 |
| ISBN | 068486438X, 9780684864389 |
| Length | 268 pages |
| Subjects | › Literary Criticism / Poetry |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |